As a technique for forming a wiring or an electrode, there is a technique, by which an electroconductive paste or an insulation paste is printed by a screen printing process. For example, for producing a wiring or an electrode of a solar cell, a frame electrode of a touch panel, an electrode of a laminated ceramic capacitor, a multilayer printed wiring board, or the like, printing is performed by printing an electroconductive paste or an insulation paste on to an object by a screen printing process. Further, for a semiconductor electrode, a semiconductor gas sensor, etc., an oxide semiconductor layer is formed on a substrate surface by screen printing using an oxide semiconductor paste.
With respect to a screen mask to be used by the above processes, an emulsion is painted on a zone, where no printing is necessary, and an electroconductive paste or an insulation paste does not pass through the zone painted with an emulsion. In other words, a pattern corresponding to a part, where mesh pores are open, can be depicted on an object.
Alternative to the process of printing by a screen printing process, another process has been known (Patent Documents 1 and 2), by which a transfer sheet provided with an electrode for transfer is prepared in advance by painting an electroconductive metal paste on a flexible sheet to a predetermined coat thickness, followed by drying, and then an electrode is formed by transferring the electrode pattern of the electroconductive metal paste from the transfer sheet to a ceramic electronic component. However, it is required to recover viscosity of the electrode surface by some method, such as heating, or spraying of a solvent for the electroconductive paste over the electrode to a semidry condition, when the electrode made of the electroconductive metal paste on the transfer sheet is pressed for transfer.
Meanwhile, Patent Document 3 describes with respect to a process for producing a toner carrier to be used in a copying machine, a printer, etc., that an electrode pattern with joint accuracy better than that by a conventional screen printing process can be formed by transferring a printing paste to an offset drum through the intermediary of a screen printing mask, and transferring and forming a wiring pattern composed of the transferred printing paste on to a circumference surface of an insulation layer provided on a cylindrical substrate surface.
Further, when printing is performed on both sides of a printing object, usually a technique is applied, by which i) a pattern is firstly printed on a surface of the printing object, and then ii) the printing object is turned over to reverse the back side and the front side, and a pattern is printed on the other surface where no pattern has been printed. However, for example, Patent Document 4 discloses a printing unit, which can print both the front side and the back side at once, for example, by conveying a printing object with rolls.